Hand-drawn Beijing: electric cars and imaginary temples – in pictures

Hand-drawn Beijing: electric cars and imaginary temples – in pictures

After 1,385 kilometres wandering the streets and more than 1,000 hours of drawing, British artist Fuller has produced an incredibly detailed vision of Beijing that takes us from looming coal plants to the fictional Temple of Loneliness and Confusion

Mon 30 Apr 2018 02.00 EDT
Last modified on Fri 11 May 2018 08.05 EDT

Coal station

British artist Gareth Wood, AKA Fuller, borrows the tools of cartography to capture the ‘sense of a place’. In 2017, he arrived in Beijing and over the course of several months walked 1,385 kilometres, working his way into the heart of the city from its outermost sixth ring road. To fight air pollution in the capital, authorities have shut several coal plants in the city, and this winter was one of the city’s cleanest in years. ‘My friends were so happy to see electric blue skies throughout the winter just gone. I wanted to mark this achievement for the city,’ he says

Forbidden Beijing

Fuller connects Beijing’s historic Forbidden City with China’s recent
Belt and Road initiative, a massive infrastructure campaign linking Europe, Africa and Asia through land and sea routes. In the drawing, silk surrounds the old residency of the Qing dynasty. A boat at the bottom left carries goods while a high-speed train is seen the right. The Belt and Road project dominates news and is well known among almost all Beijingers. ‘It’s in the background all the time,’ Fuller says

Temple of Loneliness and Confusion

Inspired by the Confucian temples that dot the city, Fuller imagined one dedicated to how he felt when he first moved to Beijing. Many of the city’s residents are also from somewhere else: young people from China’s poorer second- and third-tier cities who have moved here for better work or school. ‘Beijing life is very, very busy. You have such little time for friendship,’ he says

QR code

In Beijing, cash is not king. QR codes, used in mobile payments for everything from restaurant bills to food shopping, are a major part of life. The QR code on the map takes viewers directly to Fuller’s
website. This section of the map also includes a moment he witnessed in the city, when a man was fast asleep in his car with his foot resting on the horn

High-speed rail

Fuller was impressed by the connectivity and breadth of China’s high-speed rail network, ‘Rejuvenation’, which has been in use since September 2017. It takes only four and a half hours to get from Beijing to Shanghai, some 819 miles – four times the distance from London to Manchester. ‘Right now, part of Beijing’s identity is confidence,’ Fuller says. ‘The technology and innovation happening here is now cutting edge. I’d say its a place where you can afford to take risks and experiment. There is an entrepreneurial spirit here that is emerging and is being fully embraced’

Electric cars

Traditional petrol-fuelled vehicles are left in a pile at a recycling yard next to Beijing’s sixth ring road, turned upside down – a symbol of how the city is upending our understanding of transportation. Scrap from the cars is used to make new electric ones. ‘China is trailblazing in electric vehicles,’ says Fuller. ‘It has a gigantic consumer market. It also needs to reduce its pollution’

‘A map of the mind’

‘Through my art I’m attempting to draw a sense of place, a map of the mind, gathering stories on the ground, of all shapes and sizes,’ says Fuller. ‘Part personal geography and the intersections of culture, environment, history and economics, it’s all pushed and pulled by connectivity, migration and the borders we create between the natural and built environment.’ The artist has previously explored and drawn other cities like London and Bristol. His creative map of Beijing will be on display at the
Art Beijing annual art fair from 29 April to 5 May.
Reporting by Xueying Wang